


Between the Dirt & Desperation

by Calesvol



Category: Spider-Man (Movies - Raimi), Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Action, Betrayal, Canon-Typical Violence, Codependency, Crossover, Mild Blood, Mild Gore, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-10
Updated: 2018-10-14
Packaged: 2019-07-29 03:20:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,368
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16255619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Calesvol/pseuds/Calesvol
Summary: Sequel to “Angry & Half in Love with You”, it’s been well over a month since Eddie moved away from San Francisco to start over in his hometown of Manhattan. Yet, it’s difficult to return to a normal life when what you were once addicted to becomes addicted to you.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: This is a crossover between Venom (2018) and Sam Raimi’s Spiderman trilogy (2002-07)

Warning(s): T, none

* * *

Cities had moods. They had character, and personalities. It was hard explaining to someone from the suburbs or a small town of 5,000 where everyone knew each other. Eddie had been born in the city of cities, the one that everyone from Helsinki to Beijing and everywhere in between thought of when asked to imagine America, even for the tiniest of moments. Even Americans themselves. Manhattan had a personality so large and old that the entire East Coast looked like it. Like the Big Apple could be any city from Maine to just a stone’s throw above the Bible belt and they wouldn’t be wrong. Not entirely.

New York was steel and teeth. It was craggy concrete that bubbled like rivers of dried and cracked lava through the streets. A raw, industrial creation. When Christ told his disciples to be fishers of men, he wondered if they’d anticipated it’d look anything like this, that the net they threw would bring people together in a new Noah’s ark. Expansive, secretive, old, haggard, but also alive. Old and new. Fast-paced and robust and industrial. It claimed chilly winter nights and congested traffic as its temple, old jazzy film noir and sleepless, caffeinated nights as its sacrifice.

San Francisco had always been different. A bright tendril of Los Angeles, soaked in sun. If the sun made its harbor in Hollywood, then San Francisco was where its rays touched first, but also where its shadows were longest. It didn’t have the steel and shadiness New York did. Or ever would. It felt like your favorite relative you saw on the holidays, of palm fronds and brisk walks on a beach crested by an ocean so brilliant it was bluer than the sky it was supposed to get its color from. Peeled away and without secrets.

Maybe that’s why he never really felt like he’d belonged. Why he finally up and left after the whole Life Foundation incident. And after divorcing himself from the Other, when it finally became apparent how utterly at the mercy he was at the symbiote, they had to part ways. Lest he lose himself on top of all sense of normalcy. Of Anne and Dan and how utterly suited and picture-perfect they were for San Francisco.

It’s why New York’s rough and tumble called him back like a siren, and he just couldn’t refuse.

“Hey, I think ya dropped these.”

The subway emerged from a long and ghastly dark tunnel that made your reflection too easy to see. The back car for the early morning train from Brooklyn was mercifully sparse, all things considering. The man in question had dropped a sheaf of photos the lights blocked its glossy contents of, until it became apparent as to what it was.

Opaque, wide eyes set in a mask made of webbing. Red like blood, like slaughter. Interrupted by a Pacific blue on the chest, crawling up the side of a skyscraper in stunning detail. Eddie became shell-shocked at the sight of it, mind phasing to a rapid negative of the photos. Blinking, it went away.

“Oh, sorry about that. Guess I’m still kind of clumsy in the morning.” The brunet who speaks with wide blue eyes and earnest, smiling thin lips is the picture of someone untouched, but not innocent.

Eddie remembered himself and smiled back. “Yeah, no, no. These are some killer shots, though. You the guy who’s been getting Spidey’s mug in the papers? Man, even I gotta envy that kinda skill.”

The other man chuckled modestly. “My boss tends to differ on that front. He thinks all my stuff is pretty mediocre.”

Eddie’s brows bounced in disbelief, sputtering, “You serious? This shit looks like you got Spidey to pose for you in a SoHo photo studio. And he thinks this is subpar? Man, I wouldn’t wanna be workin’ for him.” Handing the photographer’s material back to him, he added, “Y’know, I do investigative journalin’ myself. Hell, I just got hired on to the Daily Bugle just the other day. We might actually see each other around.”

A boyish and incredulous look crossed the brunet’s face almost shyly. “Wait, seriously? What are the chances of that? —Oh, I’m Peter, by the way. Peter Parker.” He offered his hand to shake. “I’m more freelance, but I guess this makes us coworkers, huh?”

“No kidding. Can’t say I’m adverse to the idea. You photographers are like the muses of us journalists. At least, I think I got that off’a fortune cookie somewhere. You headed to HQ or somethin’?” Smiling crookedly, he shook Peter’s hand a little too enthusiastically. Blame finally getting something resembling a friend on that. “Oh, uh—yeah, Peter. I’m Eddie. Eddie Brock. Real name’s a bit longer, but kinda pointless, y’know?”

Their hands finally released, Eddie backtracking to whether or not he’d shaken it for too long. Clearing his throat, visibly fidgeting, he awkwardly ushered Peter through when they’d finally made it to a mutually apparent destination. “Hey, uh—after you, Pete.”

Peter smiled thinly at that. “Bugle’s this way. It’s not all that hard to miss.” Completely oblivious as to the sudden change in demeanor, Eddie shrugged and alighted on the platform with the other. At least he wasn’t going it alone this time around.

* * *

“Will you shut that thing off! If I have to hear one more goddamn word out of that smug Daily Planet’s reporter’s mouth, someone’s going to get fired!”

John Jonah Jameson leaned back in his rickety reclining chair, proudly smoking a thick cigar, a smug and politically incorrect aura bleeding from it. Thick brows raised dubiously as he went through Peter’s crop of photos like an inspector of choice swine at the country market, sticking a knife in the fat to gauge its leanness of the meat. And by the way his cigar hung from his teeth, he didn’t look too impressed.

“This the best you’ve got, Parker? I’ve seen brats on Instagram take better selfies at 3 AM after getting the damn munchies.” Peter himself looked tense, jaw gritting but too subtle to be noticeable or angry. Even Eddie found himself morbidly fascinated by the exchange and feeling vaguely bad for Peter himself.

“It’s the best I’ve got, Mr. Jameson. I got better lighting, and everything,” Peter reasoned, bordering on protesting, splaying his inventory out more. “Like for that one scoop you were talking about. I got this,” he pointed to a photo of the Friendly Neighborhood Spider accelerating up a wall in the wake of a crime scene, “in exactly the kind of context you were looking for and everything.” Incriminating, but falsely planted. Just what sort of deal had they made, anyways?

“It’s crap,” Jameson rebutted bluntly. “You think stories are made from HD screenshots? Nah, I want in-action pictures, Parker. Hell, I think it’s why teaming you up with Brock here will do you some good. You’ve got promise, but I just don’t see it—”

“Sir, your wife she’s—”

“Tell her I’ll call her back! Can’t you see I’m busy?” Jameson barked to his secretary who shrunk back, gazing sidelong as though the employees at desks behind her back were a captive audience. Jerking his head towards Eddie, he quipped gregariously, “What do you say, Brock? You up to heading to Oscorp to interview Doctor Octavius?”

Eddie needed a moment to mull over the name, feeling a pit open in his stomach at the realization. Oh God. Oh no—this was turning into San Fran all over again. Exactly what he’d been trying to escape. Except—Eddie calmed his breathing. It didn’t have to be a repeat. He’d get the interview, get in, get out, and not stick his neck where it didn’t belong like last time. Easy.

“You can count on me, Mr. J. I’ll keep Petey here from takin’ photos that look too good, eh?” As if to prove a point, Eddie circled an arm around Peter’s shoulder and shook it for emphasis, Parker glancing at him in bemusement, brows furrowed.

“Yeah…what he said, Mr. Jameson,” Peter replied stiffly, shrugging Eddie’s arm off and offering him a distantly apologetic look.

Alright, that was something. Only one more head-ducking event to go, and he’d be in the clear!

* * *

Several days later of navigating his way through an apartment at various stages of unpacking, and Eddie cobbled together an outfit that seemed decent enough: a button-down dress shirt, crisp black slacks, penny loafers, a dark jacket, and tie. Dressy, but still informed the world that he wasn’t some Washington Post shill. Remembering his past mistake with Carlton Drake seared the reminder not to get involved, not to fuck this up. He did enough time with what happened and paid dearly for it.

Even if he’d turned a new leaf, that didn’t mean he didn’t lie awake thinking about the symbiote. He did. God, he did. It was just the little things, mainly. Buying chocolate and tater tots and wondering why the hell he had. Thinking something and pausing, waiting for a response. It was messing with him, but he had to move on. If Venom was really that hellbent on keeping him, it would’ve. But, it didn’t. He had to remember that and move on. All graceful, and shit.

That didn’t make the memory of their parting any easier. Why did it still come back and bite him in the ass? It had been a month, maybe more. Why did his heart still ache like there was an emptiness to fill?

“C’mon Eddie, get your shit together,” he muttered to himself after stepping off the platform in Midtown Manhattan where the Oscorp tower rose in rivalry to that of Stark Industries’. It was an enviable life, being able to live so richly and without much complication, building an empire off the wit, grit, and ambition that made the American Dream. …Eddie mentally jotted that down. That could make for a good opener in his article.

“There you are. Right where I left you.” Eddie smiled at the sound of Peter’s voice. Sweater vest over some dress shirt and crisp trousers; the glasses made Parker look like a classic point Dexter. Guess that made Eddie the classic rebel to match.

“Yeah, yeah. Least Aunt May spiffed you up pretty good, eh? We ought’a start going; looks like it might start soon, an’ all.”

After their first meeting, they’d met a few times at a bar. First, it was logistics. The sense and sensibility that came with networking that any New Yorker in any industry worth his salt knew how to do. Brock wouldn’t have gotten nearly as far otherwise. Then, it was real friendly talk. Bonding over being born and bred city slickers felt like a homecoming he didn’t ask for, but sorely appreciated. It was nice having friends that didn’t quite stick as much in San Francisco.

“You ready to head on up, or does your hair need more greasing?” Peter teased as they crossed the street in unison. “Could stop at McDonald’s, too.” God, the shit-eating grin. Parker had a real mouth on him when he wanted to. A real potshot when it came to sarcasm and its humor.

“Can it, wise guy. Let me look a little bit smart ‘ere.”

Little more words were exchanged when a familiar professionalism beholden to men in journalism overcame them both almost in tandem, greeted by a front desk secretary who gave them both guest passes specific to the press conference Doctor Octavius was holding in one of Oscorp’s more “public-friendly” labs. Fair enough, even though the investigator in him wanted nothing less than to pass through all restrictions and really see the seedy underbelly. No corporation made it this big without a few body bags along the way.

At the demonstration proper, an enormous curtain separated the small gathering of reporters and journalists like them from the class act behind it. Eddie folded his arms and Peter appeared equally pensive, but a lot less out of place amid shined shoes and news anchor smiles.

“So, this guy, this Otto Octavius—any idea what he’s got cookin’, or we just gonna be surprised?” Eddie turned to Peter to ask who was like a kid in a candy store. He was still in is later college years, far as he knew. Practically a friggin’ baby, which explained a lot. That put a couple years between them. “’Cuz I ain’t really the surprises type.”

“Well, yeah. That’s kinda the whole point, right? Besides, it looks like it’ll start soon.” Peter’s eyes were wide as saucers and totally affixed to the front row. “Let’s get up front. I want a good view of what we might see.”

A flutter of anticipation and nervousness flowered in Eddie’s breast, practically feeling preemptive adrenaline pump through his veins. “…If ya say so, Petey. Guess it can’t hurt.” Why did it feel as though a sense of foreboding hung over them like a cloud? Along with something damnably familiar? Eddie swallowed down a clout of nerves he hadn’t felt before, following it tow as Peter dragged him to the front where no one seemed to mind. The lab’s ampitheater slanted downwards, anyway, so it’s not like they were blocking anything.

Clutching his camera in hand, Peter looked as though he might unleash a barrage of snapshots in his excitement. Which suited him just fine. Not that the camera shutters weren’t going off already like Peter was trying to commit to memory via his camera. Eddie, meanwhile, ticked on the portable recorder he kept on his person at almost all times, checking the small mic clipped on his jacket’s lapel.

And just in the nick of time, too. The lights dimmed substantially from their florescent blaze. Across the stage did a middle-aged and stocky man come unto the podium, smiling in a way that did little to offset the brooding intensity beneath heavy, thick eyebrows. The face of a scientist who grimly saw the failing condition of the world and had many a sleepless night trying to contrive of ways to offset the inevitable flatline. Cartlon Drake had that look, he remembered. This man wore it more intensely, and that much was exceedingly obvious.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we stand upon the brink. We live in a world where we’ve yet to explore the unknown while what we do is on the verge of collapse. And in response to it, it is the burden of those gifted with an aptitude of their calling to answer that call and play their part in saving this planet. The only one of its kind that we know of.”

With all the aegis of someone of his stature, of his eminence as a scientist, it still made Eddie feel wary of him. Even before the crawling sense of déjà vu, it clung to his tongue like gum and stuck there. What he wanted to speak out against before he even knew what it was. Clapping once, the maroon curtain rose and slowly did that sensation return stronger than it had ever before.

He should’ve known something out there was conspiring against him. Before him, in a cylindrical tube, was the symbiote. He could feel a low pulse that hummed softly, knowing exactly what it was doing: subduing the Other. Slowly did Eddie’s arms unfold, completely transfixed, and he had to resist every urge in his body to leap on stage and bash the glass in.

It was in _pain_.

Dr. Octavius gestured at the tank with a sweeping gesture, a dark humor in his smile. “I present to you the symbiote. Roughly a month ago as I’m sure you are all aware, the Life Foundation discovered these beings on an unsanctioned space flight. In San Francisco, innocent human lives were subjected under the machinations of Carlton Drake to try and bond it and others like it. Inhumane, and completely reprehensible.”

Venom stirred in the tank, almost in a stupor before rousing to life. Familiar, achingly agonized eyes widened in recognition of Eddie and the symbiote began writhing madly in the tank, inky tendrils crawling up its curve in futility, as if trying to escape to get back to him. His heart caught in his throat that throbbed sympathetically, every protective instinct in his body revving to high gear that wanted to spirit it away. As if knowing his thoughts, Venom thrashed in desperation and he swore he could hear it whimper and whine as though it were next to him, panicking once it knew he was here.

“It’s alive. Instead of subjecting this creature to the harms of bonding to a human host, we mean to study it, to replicate its properties without bringing harm to humans. Through this being, this symbiote, we intend upon harnessing its potential as both armor and protection and regeneration to benefit mankind. Think of it: a suit that could heal the infirm and disabled, helping them walk again. Or, sending people armed in this suit to hazardous places to save endangered lives in the wake of disaster. Even going beyond that, at no cost of life.”

While Octavius continued orating, Eddie tried to maintain his composure, but it was difficult with every passing second. His field of vision completely whited out save for his view of the symbiote, how it was practically ready to capsize the container in its desperation with Eddie so near. He hardly heard a word spoken until Octavius mentioned him by name, Peter’s perplexed look matching that dozen who stared at him in unison.

“Mr. Brock, is it? I’ll admit, I was surprised to find you among the list of those who were in attendance, but pleasantly surprised. Please, why don’t you come up here? Maybe you can hold their attention better than I can.” There was a murmur of polite laughter, though there was nothing humorous in the scientist’s eyes. If anything, it looked more like he was sharpening a knife and Eddie was the whetstone.

“Oh—right, yeah, sure thing, Doctor Octavius,” Eddie responded automatically, smile tense as he vaulted on the stage instead of taking the short set of stairs nearby. No one seemed to really mind, despite the formalness of the event. Hooking his thumbs in his pockets, it was a struggle not to keep his eyes wholly trained on the symbiote that loosed a long-pitched whine at their close proximity.

“Now, as many of you may be aware, Mr. Brock was one of two known successful hosts that bonded with one of the symbiotes, notably this one. I’ll admit, I’m quite curious: what was it like, being at the mercy of this fascinating creature?”

Eddie swallowed thickly, Peter’s blue eyes intense upon him that he only surreptitiously met. With every moment under the limelight, he felt his self-control crumbling and a white-hot rush of adrenaline take its place. He was sick. He was so fucking sick and he hadn’t even touched the Other in over a month, their time together having been brief enough as it was. “See, that’s the thing. It’s not really a ‘creature,’ y’know what I’m sayin’? It’s alive. Maybe not our definition of alive, but it thinks, it feels—it knows what it is. Who it is.”

Disguising his adrenalized state as thoughtful pacing, he rounded away from Octavius who watched him hawkishly, conspiratorial murmurs ringing the crowd like mist, like gathering storm clouds. And he could hear it in waves. “Humanity often thinks we’re the only ones out there capable of thinkin’ about our place in the universe, of makin’ bonds so profound that even the sun feels cold to us.” A flash of red along the wall: a fire extinguisher. It looked heavy. Heavy enough.

In the calm before the storm, he placed his hand on the glass, barely aware of the flashing bulbs of the cameras. Venom reacted intensely, that familiar, savage purr as it pressed itself yearningly to the glass, a passion so heavy it weighed like blood. “’s alright. I’m here now, baby. I’ll get ya outta there.” If it could devour the oils from his fingers, the milky clear prints left behind, the lingering heat—it would. Starved, so starved, not even meat could sate that hunger.

“What was it like being its host, Mr. Brock?” one of the reporters prompted, a stern blonde with flinty-ash eyes. “Were there any detriments to your health? You look fine, by looks alone.”

Eddie cleared his throat, coughing into his hand. Octavius’ gaze was like irons on his, having seen it from the sidelong view he had of the tank. Eddie’s own faltered as he pretended to focus exclusively on the crowd, Peter’s enthusiasm faltering. Like he knew about the chaos to unleash.

Posturing to look as though he were preparing to answer the question, he instead bolted for the fire extinguisher and paid no attention to the sudden shock upon the crowd while Octavius’ smug darkness shifted to a frenzied possession. Lunging for the tank, Eddie manfully smashed the glass, taking several tries before there was a fissure enough for Venom to seep through and spring into Eddie’s arms. Despite the whizzing of bullets from the security guards stationed nearby, Venom craned up to lick Eddie’s lips in a semblance of a kiss, wanting to sink into it. To be enveloped and taken by that tar pit he’d feared.

 ** _“Eddiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeee,”_** Venom crooned adoringly, wrapping around the blond with aplomb and all the anxiousness of before melting away. A massive black tarp of its nebulous miasma unfurled like crow’s wings around them, the bullets repelled uselessly. It nuzzled into his neck, content to stay there forever.

“Hey, Ven, we gotta get outta here. Y’think you can help me out here?”

A toothsome, wolfish smile of all fangs spanned its black lips, eyes narrowing in a feral cheer. **“We’ll protect Eddie. We’ll keep him safe,”** came its savage purr, all before the proximity between them closed with a harsh entanglement of mouth and tongue, Eddie forgetting to breathe and almost glad not to. Gradually, the eddies of his vision clouded away to a soothing blackness, one he never thought would’ve been.

_And I’ll keep you safe, too—promise._

All he could remember last was rocketing into the very sky, smashing through skylights that rained down like shards of ice and incited a panic, Octavius enraged while the rest scattered. It was to be a state of emergency, sure, but little else mattered now.

All faded to black.


	2. Chapter 2

Warning(s): T, animal death, non-sexual vore, violence

* * *

The symbiote was relentlessly starved when they finally made some sort of harbor a dark place where grime crawled deeper and lower than the rats Venom gorged itself upon, being generous, ginger. It withdrew from coating the whole of Eddie’s body and instead emerged like a serpent, slithering and bobbing as it devoured what it could while Eddie watched on apathetically. Not because he didn’t care, but because it held less horror for him than it should. Those few days together—had it been less? Whatever it was, there had been no time to slow down and _think_. Here and now, in the deafening silence, there was.

Without having to be told, he knew that it’d known Maria. They had been together for a time, and it let him access that trust through the hum of tension. The hum that sometimes growled. A pigeon panicked and squawked when Venom lunged and crushed the bird in its jaws in a sickening crunch of finality, feathers and thin talons sticking from its jaws before swallowing it down whole. Then, more rats. More crunching and devouring and sick noises instead of what hung in the air like a noose.

Eddie squatted on a crushed cardboard box while it ate, unwilling to shut his eyes lest he saw what Venom did. The blood, the viscera, a taste that would make him retch if he let himself. His skin felt clammy. Oh, he’d been sweating. His clothes clung to his body unpleasantly, almost like he’d been dipped in water. Was it him, or Venom? He couldn’t tell anymore.

All he did know was, in the silence, there wasn’t any censor. While Venom feigned like it was fully absorbed in foraging for prey, everything passed between them. Every badly suppressed sensation, emotion. The cautious relief, the tension, the anxiety—those were Venom’s, he thinks. Or was it both? All Eddie really knew was his own caution, the tension, the suspicion, the—oh. So, there was some overlap. Did he fear it? Suddenly, everything he’d done came in sharp relief and the last month had felt like withdrawal. This…it was like taking a hit but getting none of the high.

Being too fucking aware to drown in the weird colors, to smell sound.

“So, how long are we gonna hole down here and pretend what happened didn’t, Ven?” It’s asked suddenly, tiredly, and now Venom flinches. He can feel it all the way up the appendage. Like a shiver down a spine. His spine, Venom’s? Or theirs. Regardless, Eddie sounded tired, frustrated. Probably not the most inviting front.

Venom slurps down the last rat. It’s morbid seeing it slide down his throat, and he can’t stand to watch. He pressed a finger to his temple, expelling a weary and terse sigh.

**“…We’re sorry, Eddie. There’s just so much we didn’t understand—”**

He can feel it. Like Venom is going to crumble, like he’d blow away if he didn’t clamor towards Eddie and twist around him for dear life. Eddie wants it, too. He wants it so much he can feel his fingers twitching, biceps tense like they’d open up at the slightest insistence and seize the symbiote in a crushing embrace. But, they can’t. Not yet. Not when Eddie doesn’t trust it. Even if he can feel its fragility, its heart that throbbed painfully.

Not when he can’t distinguish what belongs to whom.

“…Could’ve asked me. I wouldn’t have minded, y’know. Just sat down and watched some fuckin’ boring documentary about… I dunno, goddamn Plato for somethin’. Freud. Those guys. Knew all about how humanity ticks.” Eddie dropped his face in his hand, digging into the hair at his hairline as he watched a trickle of water run past to a storm sewer. He wanted to sleep. But, he couldn’t just leave things hanging like this.

A drop on his forehead. Who…? Nah, it was just beginning to rain. He forgot how cold and dreary Manhattan could be. Glancing towards Venom, the symbiote looking like the alien equivalent of a kicked puppy, the downpour starting.

“Com’mere. I don’t want ya gettin’ all soaked like that.” Putting his hood up, Venom retracted some back into his body, like ink soaking up parchment. The part that remained hung on the hoodie’s collar and tucked itself beneath his chin, warm and pliant beneath his stubble. Meekly did Venom rub himself against his chin, which admittedly tickled. Eddie broke out in a quick grin and chuffed softly, which earned a relieved pause from Venom as it continued to nuzzle into his jawline.

It was a start, at least.

**“…We don’t want to end up like last time. We missed you, Eddie. …We want a second chance.”** Venom’s words were quiet and admissive, and totally vulnerable. He could feel a tightness in his chest that wasn’t his own.

Eddie nodded, a thoughtful silence descending even as he got soaked, rain dripping from the lip of his hood. “I wanna trust you, Ven. I do, it’s just— …Funny. How people all over the world lead these fuckin’ lonely lives. Top brass. Lowest scum. And everyone in between who doesn’t have anyone to understand them. Not in the way they wish they could. Boy, if they knew the damn cost of it all.” Venom filled a side of Eddie’s hoodie, nuzzling yearningly into the blond’s cheek and rubbing affectionately. Absently, he grazed his lips against the symbiote that began purring deeply. “And now, I got it. Y’think it wouldn’t be this fuckin’ complicated, sharing headspace an’ all.”

Venom breathed softly against Eddie’s neck, pressing into his pulse. **“You were kind to her. We saw it through her eyes. You were a good friend.”**

Eddie swallowed thickly. “Yeah,” he agreed hoarsely, voice cracking huskily, feeling his eyes mist wetly. “Too bad she ain’t here to say so. _Fuck_ —”

“You’re a real hard guy to track down, Brock. Guess I’m lucky you didn’t get very far.”

Eddie reared to stand and upset whatever water had been accumulating on him, like a statue suddenly come to life, perched over a gloomy autumn fountain and under a funeral shroud sky. There was the red. Red he remembered. But somehow shouldn’t but did. Spiderman. He’d seen him before in the papers, but that red looked different in person. Realer. Too vivid for a dark city.

“Spiderman? Th’ hell’re you doin’ here?” Eddie asked in surprise, Venom having vanished at the right time.

“Enough of the talk. You’ve got the symbiote, Brock. A lot of people are gonna get hurt if you don’t give it up.”

“What, is there a crime against loiterin’ in alleyways? Or are ya suddenly an avenger for fuckin’ vermin?” the blond demanded incredulously, those inscrutable opaque lenses making it impossible to tell what the vigilante was thinking. He could feel Vernom’s trepidation evolve into something malicious, tenebrous shadow building behind him like a nascent forest fire.

**“ _Spiderman_!”** Venom seethed menacingly, claws curling and fangs bared menacingly. Its eyes narrowed to slits, Eddie feeling its inky substance creep up his skin and over his clothes. So, it was really coming to that? That they’d be the villains jumping innocent people in dark alleyways?

Spiderman poised himself to attack, reflexively wheeling a step back when Venom’s form grew like a cloud, sucking Eddie into that familiar black mist. “Wait—you two know each other?”

“Boy, I wish it was just a mutual acquaintanceship, but I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t know what a threat that thing is, Brock. And you’re in danger if you keep using it!” Spiderman proclaimed in a truer accusation. “You have no idea what this thing is really capable of.”

The cogs in Eddie’s brain began turning. “Wait—so you were the schmuck who handed Ven over to those exploitive creeps?!” Anger. There it was. Like finding a pilot light beneath a tank of petrol and lighting it. There was an emotion he didn’t mind sharing for once. And it was symbiotic between them.

A rumbling noise interrupted what the two were saying. **“I bonded with him temporarily, Eddie. Because…I missed it. I missed _us_. Spiderman treated us like another suit. It lasted for a few days before a Dr. Richard Reeds parted us.” ** The hiss it uttered was low and banal, burgeoning with resentment. And now, of course Spiderman wanted to do the right thing and put them on the slaughterhouse floor they liked to call justice. **“We’re a _monster_ to him, Eddie.”**

Whatever had gone on between them suddenly didn’t matter. Spiderman acted on impulse and slung his webbing on two dumpsters and hauled them back manfully, both metal cannisters careening and bouncing roughly on concrete before Venom enveloped him completely, like drowning in those 20,000 leagues under the sea without a submarine. It was familiar, like a womb. They were one again.

**“YOU HURT US!”** Venom roared as it caught one of the dumpsters and pitched it at Spiderman who reflexively leaped over it. **“And now—you threatened to hurt Eddie! _We’ll never forgive you_!” ** It was less heartbreak here and more a possessive and righteous anger. At least, righteous to _them_. Here, in the darkness, everything felt right. Only Spiderman was wrong. He would never part them!

“Brock, if you’re in here, listen to me: I know how it feels! It feels great, at first. But this…this _thing_ , it’s leeching on everything wrong! It makes it worse and—” Venom roared indignantly and tore the other dumpster in two, leaping to bear the weight on its blow that Spiderman barely avoided, vaulting into the air several feet up and racing up the side of the building. “—It’s going to ruin you if you keep this up!”

**“SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP!”** Venom roared furiously, its own webbing soaring its body into the sky as it gave chase to Spiderman who took off in hot pursuit of a place predictably further away from civilians. **“We won’t let you or anyone else separate us ever again!”** Rage. The white-hot, poetic rage that would make the stars tremble. A romantic rage of tortured poets who saw the futility of gray skies and death. It was here, raw and maligned. Except towards Eddie. Despite everything, nothing could make it hurt Eddie.

_His Eddie._

Spiderman landed squarely against the side of a warehouse, practically soundless. He couldn’t let innocent people get hurt, but inside no one was there in the charge of shifts. Maybe it’d cause damage, but all he cared about was the preservation of life. Not lost assets.

Adroitly did he use his webbing to open a narrow enough window near the roof and catapult his way through it, assessing his surroundings in the blink of an eye. The stacks were at least a few stories high, enough to provide ammunition against the symbiote. And—speakers!

Venom rocketed through the same window with a loud violence, struggling to squeeze through compared to the slender Spider. Glass shards rained as it landed heavily, a shake in the air as its tongue tasted the air. **“We can hear you, little spider! Climbing higher up the water spout, ha!”** the symbiote taunted, arrogance rife in its very veins. It stalked the long avenues of boxes and paraphernalia, Spiderman high aloft and studying its movements.

Wait—were those exhaust vents? And tankards of gas.

That gave him an idea.

“Hey, ugly! Over here!” The jeer got Venom’s attention, the symbiote snarling as it propelled itself upwards and swung through the rafters, just rows away from Spiderman. The masked arachnid dropped down when Venom barreled through and came too close, landing deftly on his feet before he found the exhaust vents. It was natural gas—perfect!

Venom waited for a brief moment, scenting the air for Peter. Quietly, and as swiftly as he could, he knocked off the spouts of two of the two natural gas tanks and a high pennywhistle of air pitched and already the stench of natural gas flooded the room. Booking it from the narrow office, he stood before and where Venom could see him. Luckily, the office’s doors looked sturdy and all but one entrance were locked, as there was only one way in or out.

“Looking for me? Guess we’re like the tortoise and the hare here, aren’t we, big guy?”

Already with a thin pride as it was, Venom snapped and devolved into a galloping morass of oily sludge as it raced towards him, Peter running headlong towards it as if embracing death. Except, he wasn’t. The smell of gasoline was acrid and likely set to implode at any minute.

At the last second did Peter dive aside while Venom barreled heedlessly into the office, ramming into several desks and overturning them in the process. Papers upset by the collision created a hail of white, obscuring their view while Peter locked the office shut with the fumes pent up inside, using his webbing to topple a row of shelving that landed cacophonously and shed its merchandise to effectively lock the pair inside, hauling it with inhuman strength to barricade the windowless room shut.

Feeling the very air shimmer with heat, Peter launched himself skyward and propelled himself by slinging through the skylight, willing that he was right and no one else was around to get hurt. He raced away as fast as his webs could take him, several blocks so before an explosion rocked the air and he was sundered to skid to a stop on a sidewalk, the silent night brightening hellishly as an inferno erupted and plumes of smoke roiled enormously and black into that grey sky, dying it sable.

Peter coughed and groaned softly, rolling on his back as he slowly got himself back on his feet, wiping away a skid mark of dirt on his mask.

Police and fire engines raced past, a cold breeze of their speeding coloring the night that same, vivid red. So different from the violence several blocks away, the vigilante’s heart heavy with a deep regret.

He didn’t like it when people died. Especially people who didn’t know what they’d gotten themselves into, but what choice did he have? Peter watched on as people slowly emerged from their homes, bundling themselves in coats and shawls as they gossiped worriedly for the flames licking the sky.

Peter bowed his head.

He had to get home. His Aunt May would be wondering where he was. Especially after all of this.


	3. Chapter 3

Warning(s): T, character death mention

* * *

When he was kid, there was a morbid game Eddie would play with the other school kids. When it was too cold to go out and play, they’d be remanded indoors since the gym wasn’t large enough to play host to them and whatever PE class was going on at the time. There was a large, old globe in one of the corners. It was a game he started, and he didn’t entirely remember why; maybe something to do with the silent blame his father hung over his head for his mother’s death.

He and what few friends he had would take turns spinning the globe with their eyes closed, a digit suspended over the revolving world until a few seconds passed and they’d bring their finger down like the arm and head-shell of a record player down on the actual record. Then, wherever it’d landed, they’d invent some outrageous story on the spot. Of how they’d died.

Eddie remembered one in particular out of the innumerable times they’d played it, where his had landed smack dab on NYC itself. He didn’t remember entirely what story he’d invented, but it had to do with aliens and an explosion—some War of the Worlds crap.

Funny how those things turn out.

Eddie coughed roughly upon awaking, feeling as though he’d been dragged through cement and then an ocean, all tactile sensation rough and dirty, starched and coarse. Too much heat. Too much smoke when his lungs craved air. As though he’d been incubated in a volcano, Eddie craned up at his vision that was still black and interrupted by jettisons of water. Too familiar. Too fucking familiar. His breath misted and tasted like plastic, robotic.

**_Eddie…_ **

“He’s awake! Man, you really got caught up in the wrong place. Can you hear me? That was quite an explosion.” He blinked blearily at the white-masked EMT who had propped him up enough to sit from the temporarily gurney inside an ambulance. How…? “We thought we’d have to take you to the hospital, but aside from some superficial scrapes, and the dirtiness, you seem fine. Unless you’d rather be taken in…?”

“Nah…’s okay. Thanks, though,” Eddie mumbled after unhooking himself from the respirator and picking his way through the cramped ambulance and to the edge of the site where the warehouse had been, looking like Galactus had punched a crater in the earth where it’d stood. Its gaping maw somehow barely strafed any nearby residences, just far enough, though debris and cinders scattered everywhere.

He needed air. Needed something blue or gray and without the acrid stench of smoke rotting dark and his lungs, to get away from this hellish ruin.

The blond’s clothes were intact, Eddie slipping behind a gathering bevy of news vans hastily setting up shop that he didn’t intend on sticking around for. Better for Spiderman to think he was dead than have his face plastered over the news. Thankfully, with the gathering throng of people, his restitution had been in a place off from the center of chaos where no one really paid him any mind. No one knew that there had been a single man, or that he’d survived

Eddie didn’t know how long they walked down bleak streets and slanting buildings that leaned into each other, this clearly a dilapidated part of town. Trees hung heavily, already beginning to turn their leaves, a phenomena that didn’t really occur in the sunny latitudes of San Fran. His walk was shaded, hood pulled over his head and feeling miserably cold. But quiet. Still. Something pulsed in him that wasn’t his.

Venom emerged and he could practically sense that it was weak, burrowing like a kitten into his neck, craving warmth. “Hey,” Eddie greeted throatily as they paused briefly, pressing his cheek against its squishy morass that began purring weakly. It was exhausted. It had been the only thing that had kept him alive. Just like last time. Kittenish licks could be felt against his jaw, meaning that the symbiote at least heard him.

This neighborhood became more familiar the more he walked. It was like a high pressure, nostalgia. Creeping like a tide to lap at his feet. Overgrown sidewalks gave way to a clearing that revealed a modest church, red brick and chipping white paint. Its belfry pierced the sky alone amid a ring of trees that encompassed it. If he looked close enough, he could see the playground he used to play at while his dad conversed with the priests. They’d be drinking buddies if vices didn’t go against their vocation.

Without really thinking of it, he walked towards the stoop and opened the double doors, the interior inside dusky and quaint. You’d think it was a church from some backwater, landlocked Midwest town and not Long Island, but here it was. Rays of pale sunlight filtered weakly through narrow windows, motes of dust swimming in it. Pews crowded close together, the interior firm and Spartan. Exactly as he remembered it. His father and he had always sat in the middle.

This was all before they’d moved to San Francisco when he was still a little kid, maybe in elementary school or so. Never mind that it had made things strained between him and his older sister, Mary. Aside from the bullying and trying to excel in school so he’d have some scrap of validation his father never gave him.

**“This…is where your parents wed.”** Its voice was still weak, but it was better than silence.

“Yeah,” Eddie confirmed, pocketing his hands in his hoodie pocket. “Looks’a lot smaller than when I last remembered it, Ven. Though, I was kinda a tiny tot way back when.”

Venom emerged cautiously as a beginning thaw, marveling at it as though it were the most amazing thing it’d ever seen. He could feel its swell of affection, something that made him freeze, but not with rejection. It felt heavy and he wasn’t ready to be crushed. While his expression seemed to darken, a note of hope was in Venom’s voice. **“Here is where humans bond. Like we did. And we’re here now.”** It sounded excited, and nervous.

Eddie leaned against the prayer rest of the front pew, one of his hands curled around its shape, against the lacquered grain. “So, what—you sayin’ we ought’a get hitched, is that what you mean, Ven?” The dry dubiousness in his voice cause Venom to shrink away. “We get ourselves all dolled up, then what? Get a fuckin’ priest to marry us? Invite my family that doesn’t acknowledge I exist and the rest a’ those buddies a’yours on Klyntar sure as hell wouldn’t come, since the betrayal an’ all? Anne’d… Nah. God!” He laughed bitterly.

Raking his fingers through his hair in frustration, his hood came off in the process. He was still filthy. But, maybe it was just karma. This was like a reflection of the outside, right? Everything ruined and decayed in him. The effigy of Jesus affixed to the crucifix gazed down at him with an old Bloodhound’s gaze. Eyes turned down like they were too heavy to smile with again. They were accusing, reminding him of what he was jabbing almost too intentionally.

“’m sorry, Ven. It’s just…a lot at once,” he sighed tiredly, feeling the symbiote emerge again. He felt like Lucifer from Cinderella, only a lot less humorous. Getting dust and grime everywhere he touched. Let alone on Venom, of all things.

“It’s gonna take awhile. Hell, I dunno how long. To get used’t— _this_. Whatever we think we are. Whatever we’re trying t’be.” Jesus’ eyes bore down at him, as if demanding he continue. So did thirteen more from the painted Stations of the Cross that encompassed the church. He had to drop his gaze back to the plain tile ground. “People don’t work that way. They don’t live inside’a each other’s heads, knowing what they’re seein’, smellin’, hearin’, thinkin’—it just ain’t like that. Hell, I’d say it makes us pretty damn stir crazy, Ven. We’re so used to livin’ like fuckin’ goldfish in a bowl and sometimes, the bowl is clear enough for people t’look in. But, the fish don’t get inside’a each other’s heads. Hell, if they’re together for too long, sometimes they downright start maulin’ each other. Two people in the same small space. Nevermind in each other’s bodies—”

**“Know you’re not like us, Eddie. Never thought you would be, but—we’re trying to understand. Understand you, and the world. Can’t stop how we feel about you,”** the symbiote reasoned adamantly, pearl-bright gaze holding his when he couldn’t meet that of the divine. **“And…it’s _strong_. Very strong.”**

Eddie’s brow wrinkled together in disbelief. “D’you really mean that, or ya just standin’ too close to the speakers and it’s all you can hear?” he asked defensively, feeling himself clam up again even while Venom was trying to get in.

It manifested as a large humanoid blot that swallowed the lights of the many candles, those for the prayers people lit as alms. A good head taller than him, all symbiote sinews and impenetrable density, Venom pushed him back against the pew he’d been leaning on—enough that his back curved from how it loomed over him. The burn of frustration and indignation welling passionately in its throat.

**“Said it yourself. You know everything we think, feel—and you think we aren’t sincere? That we’re _faking_ it?”** Venom scoffed disdainfully, lips curling in a snarl, bringing its gaze level and powerfully over Eddie’s, strands of matters clinging to the hem of his jeans from their proximity. Even if he wouldn’t yield **. “We know you’re bullshitting yourself if you really think that, Eddie.”**

That didn’t mean he’d falter. Eddie pushed back, craning up to sink his teeth into Venom’s neck like that first night. That night he still couldn’t tell was a mistake or not. Venom’s chest rumbled audibly and it was enough to loosen its hold, insinuating more but instead taking Venom by its chin and forcing it to look in his eyes. “Not here,” he commanded firmly, but not cruelly, gaze boring with insolvent stone into Venom’s. By its chin did he guide it away, stepping from their intimate closure.

“That’s not what we’re here for,” he murmured after a long moment, Eddie’s gaze growing distant with grief as he fished for a wad of cash he tossed indiscriminately in the donation basket nearest the candles. He procured a relatively long but intact match and suspended it over an already lit candle, jerking his head for Venom to join him at his side while he knelt. “Help me with this. We met because’a Maria, y’know. We owe her one.”

Reverently did Venom’s tenebrous hand envelop Eddie’s and it was warm. He smiled low but approvingly, lowering together to light an untouched candle. “I dunno if you had any gods back where you were from, on Klyntar—I mean. But just…focus on Maria. I wanna feel everything.”

Though Venom seemed reluctant to open those floodgates, it sank on the kneeler, emulating Eddie’s pose. “…Knull. He created us,” the symbiote said, not expounding further. And Eddie didn’t push for it.

Pain. So much pain. Maria hadn’t been healthy before she’d died, and his palms twitched spasmodically and he grimaced, feeling her death throes. Everything before she perished. The panic, the voices, the fear and remembering him— Eddie exhaled stiffly and deep, head tucked down and back bowed before he could straighten. Venom’s hand steadied on his back, expression discernibly concerned.

**“She had happy moments, Eddie. She showed us you. Untouched mornings. Brilliant sunlight. Kind people who made sure she was safe. Like you.”** He didn’t know whether it was supposed to make him or Venom feel better, but he felt…a little less guilty. She hadn’t been alone, and her death hadn’t been their fault. Venom hadn’t known any better. Maybe for a moment. He still felt at fault, even if— …No. Venom felt guilt. He knew what Maria had been to him. **“…She didn’t die hating you. You saved her…and us.”**

“…Maybe,” Eddie said, unclasping his hands and staring deep at that flickering flame. He folded his arms on the prayer rest, conflict broiling in his eyes. His lips quirked a little when he felt Venom rest its head on his shoulder, arm circling his shoulders. Funny how an alien acted more human than most.

“It won’t be an easy road, Ven. We make nice now, maybe we’ll know more than before. We’ve gotta lotta shit in shore for us. You sure you wanna put up with all’a that?” He felt Venom’s smile span wolfishly.

**“Always did like a good challenge. You’ll trust us, we’ll prove ourselves.”**

Eddie nodded, still feeling muddy and heavy. Sometimes, he tried pretending like Maria wasn’t really gone. That he’d wake up on a sunny morning with Anne’s petite form next to him, warm and gold swimming in her hair. That everything would be back to normal, even the cracked and broken parts of it.

“I jus’ hope you’re right, Ven. I really do.”


End file.
